


Happiness

by WolfAndHound_Archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Post-Sirius in Azkaban, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-07
Updated: 2016-02-07
Packaged: 2018-05-18 20:46:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5942566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WolfAndHound_Archivist/pseuds/WolfAndHound_Archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Learning to live together</p>
            </blockquote>





	Happiness

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Lassenia, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Wolf and Hound](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Wolf_and_Hound), which was created to make stories posted to the Sirius_Black_and_Remus_Lupin Yahoo! mailing list easier to find. However, even though I still love the fandom, I am no longer active in it and do not have the time to maintain it. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in December 2015. I posted an announcement with Open Doors, but we may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on the [Wolf and Hound collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/wolfandhound/profile).

I come home just a little before sunset. Home, I can't even begin to explain to the two of you what this little cottage means to me. Maybe I don't need to. Home must mean just as much to the man who spent his whole life unwelcome and adrift and to the boy brought up in ignorance, unwanted and unloved. We've all suffered. I just pray this little house will be able to act as antidote and heal some of the pain.

You're in the kitchen cooking supper and talking together. When I come in you both smile. I get a quick shy hug from one of you and a hasty blushing kiss from the other. We set the table, eat supper, and clean up in harmonious companionship. We've begun to be comfortable around one another. We were all rather cautious in the beginning. I'm especially happy to see that the student-teacher relationship is being replaced by something closer.

I turn the radio on in the sitting room. My lover curls up in one of the chairs with a book and my godson drags out the chess set. When I was younger, I remember wishing that my life would always be exciting. Now I'm content to sit quietly in this warm comfortable room with the two people I love best in the world. The music is soft and familiar. Sometimes we sing along with the music, sometimes we talk about nothing important, and sometimes we are silent.

When the evening is over, Remus shuts off the radio and goes upstairs with his book. Harry puts away the chess pieces and follows. I go around making sure the windows are shut and the doors are locked and everything is secure. Whenever either of you sees me performing this little ritual, you smile but say nothing. Do you both just know that I need to do this? Do you have your own little rituals that I haven't discovered yet.

Harry is already in bed when I come upstairs. I go in and bend over the bed and touch his shoulder. He smiles up at me, and I remember another boy with messy hair smiling at me.

"G'night Sirius." He whispers, his voice fuzzy with sleep. I bend over a press a kiss to his forehead. I feel as awkward as I did when I held him in my arms at his christening but he doesn't seem bothered.

"Sleep well." I tell him as I slip out of the room. Hedwig, ruffles her feathers as I pass her cage.

Remus is reading in bed when I get to our room. The candlelight gives him a golden glow. He was lovely as a boy and he's even more beautiful now. Of the three of us, the change that our time in this house together has wrought, is most obvious in him. Exhaustion no longer shadows his face and the grip that pain has on him has lessened.

I undress in the warm glow of the candle's flame, while he marks his place and lays the book on the table beside the bed. He is naked beneath the covers, and I do not bother with nightclothes. When I crawl in beside him he opens his arms, cradling me close. His lips are sweet against mine.

He asks about blowing out the candle, his voice quiet and low. I need to see him, I tell him and he smiles. I need more then to just see him and he knows it and acquiesces happily. He has always been a wonderful lover to me. He knows when to be gentle and when to be rough, aggressive and yielding, wanton and teasing. Sometimes my need for him frightens me even as I glory in his wholehearted response to my passion.

Later as we lie together, sated, I realize that no paradise could ever compare with this feeling. I am safe, warm, protected and loved. The people I love best are close by and secure under the same roof. Our enemies have been vanquished. The morning may bring trouble by the score but tonight I will fall asleep knowing this is true happiness.


End file.
